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.P92 LESSONS OF ENCOURAGEMENT 

Copy 1 



TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 



BY 



GEORGE L. PRENTISS, 

)Pastoi of tt)t (Tduictl o! t^t Cobmant 



NEW YOKE: 
ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH, 

6 8 3 BROADWAY 
1S63. 



LESSONS OF ENCOURAGEMENT 



FROM THE 



TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 



BY . 

GEORGE L, PRENTISS, 

pastor of i^it ffitiurcfi of tfie dobenant. 



NEW TOEK: 

ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH, 

683 BROADWAY 

1863. 






% ^txman. 



PREACHED ON SUNDAY MOENING, FEBEUAEY 22, 1863. 



PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. 



LESSONS OF ENCOURAGEMENT FROM 
THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 



The Lord our God be with us, as He was with our fathers ; let Him not leave us nor 
forsake us." — 1 Kings viii. 57. 

The attentive reader of the Bible cannot fail to be struck 
■with the manner in which the Jewish people cherished the 
traditions of their national history. That history carried the 
back to the very gates of Paradise. The names and the events 
that rendered it so remarkable, were familiar to them as house- 
hold words ; it was a part of their religion to hold both in 
everlasting remembrance. Perhaps no nation ever existed in 
which the ancestral and patriotic spirit was so powerfully de- 
veloped. It was wrought into all their sacred rites. It was 
enabodied and enjoined in their holy books. It found expres- 
sion in their public festivals and anniversaries. Long exile 
only rendered it more intense. If I forget thee^ Jerusalem., 
let my right hand forget its cunning. If I do not remember thee^ 
let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth : if I prefer not 
Jerusalem ahove my chief joy. ISTow after they have been 
scattered and torn for nearly two thousand years, the Hebrew 
race still cling with delight to the great men and events of their 
most distant past ; they still feel bound by the closest ties to 
the ages of the Patriarchs, of Moses, of King David, and the 
Prophets. 

If, then, we needed the sanction of Scripture to justify the 
connecting of memorable days and incidents in our history 
with our religious services, we have it abundantly. The Old 
Testament and the New are full of such sanction. They teach 
us, both by precept and example, that the threads of our 



^ 



4 LESSONS OF ENCOUKAGEMENT FEOM 

national destiny are in the hands of God, and are woven by 
Him according to His own will. They teach us that the fortu- 
nate events which have helped to establish and unfold our na- 
tional life, and the illustrious mei>who took the lead in those 
events, were ordained of Heaven, and that we should remember 
them with pious gratitude, and should hand them down in 
honor to our posterity. There is no other way to keep bright 
and unbroken the links of that mystic chain which binds us 
in dutiful aiiection to the Past and to the Future. It is a sad 
mark of degeneracy, when a people never stop, both for their 
own and for tjieir children's sake, to commemorate the virtues 
and take counsel of the example of their forefathers ; just as it 
is the sign of a poor and shallo^v domestic life when, rooted in 
the present alone, it is enriched by no old and hallowed family 
memories. 

This Christian Sabbath, as you are aware, is also the anni- 
versary of the birth-day of that incomparable man, whose 
name is still enshrined, as is no other, in the reverence and 
grateful affections of the American people. It is a day to be 
forever marked with a white stone. He, whose birth it recalls, 
was justly entitled the Father of his Country. He was, and 
is, our greatest earthly benefactor. In raising him up to be 
the leader of our revolutionary armies, and then to be the 
wise counselor, organizer, and first President of the infant 
Republic, God bestowed upon us a gift for which neither we 
nor our latest posterity shall ever be sufficiently thankful. 
The influence and character of George Washington have done 
more to form the Union, and to render it so worthy of our love 
than any other single human cause. The world has seen as yet 
only the first fruits of this benignant and mighty influence. 
When the fierce storm of civil discord now beating upon us, 
and threatening wreck to the great Ship of State, whose keel 
was laid by that wise master-builder, shall have passed away, 
I doubt not the name of Washington will become again, as it 
was in other days, a political talisman and bond of union to 
the whole nation, and the most perfect symbol of American 
patriotism. 

Since our troubles commenced, the question, I suppose, has 



THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 5 

suggested itself to thonsands of minds: "What would have 
been the course of Washington — how would he have acted in 
this crisis?" a question which, it is obvious, could be answered 
only after deciding several important previous questions. It 
is a subject, however, which I do not propose to discuss ; nor 
would its discussion, in this mere personal form, be likely to 
yield any good fruit. Every man's duty is prescribed by the 
Providential work and circumstances of his own age. God 
does not allow us to serve Ilim, or to serve our generation, 
by mere rote. As Christians, we have our peculiar task quite 
as truly as the apostles and evangelists, and primitive saints 
had theirs. Their doctrine and example should guide and ani- 
mate us, but that is all. We can copy and repeat their specific 
work no more than we can go back eighteen hundred years^ 
and pass through our probation in the first, instead of the 
nineteenth century. So, too, as American citizens, we have 
our appointed task quite as distinctly as our patriot fathers 
had theirs. Their exalted principles of action and their 
faithful example we may well adopt and imitate ; but as to 
our work itself, it must be something very different from a 
bare copy of theirs, or it will be a miserable failure. Unless the 
object of our intelligent choice, wrought in the sweat of our own 
face, inspired by own personal trust in God, and stamped also 
with the impress of our individual character and responsibility, 
it cannot be genuine : it will not live on, waxing in strength 
and honor after we are dead. Washington, and the noble 
army of Revolutionary heroes and sages, who fought, and 
toiled, and sufi^ered with him, quitted them with rare fidelity 
and wisdom in their day ; but if they were to come back to 
earth just as they left it, they could not assume our duties ; 
they would find themselves perplexed and bafiled at every 
turn ; they would have to be educated over again before they 
could take our places. What is wanted, then, is not that we 
should give way to the men — the wiser and better men, it may 
be — of former times ; but that we should be more profoundly 
imbued with their patriotic virtues; that we should rise to the 
height of their lofty patience, perseverance, moral courage, faith 
in God, and loyal self-devotion. That is what we want. And 



6 LESSONS OF ENCOUEAGEMENT FROM 

the more religiously we study the times and character of our 
fathers, the more devoutly we cherish their memories, in order 
to resemble them in these things, so much the better. 

This brings me to the topic on which 1 desire to speak to you 
during the rest of this hour, viz. — Some of the lessons of encour- 
agement tole drawn from a comjparisonofthe times of Washington 
with the troublous tim.es tJirough ivhich we are passing. I assume, 
of course, as the basis of my remarks, that our war of indepen- 
dence was a righteous struggle, and that the civil revolution 
by which it was inaugurated and completed, justly deserves 
to be ranked among the most important and auspicious move- 
ments of modern civilization. This is a point I need not stop 
to argue, for it is a part of our consciousness and birth-right 
as American citizens. I assume, further, that the war for the 
Union, in which we are now engaged, is also a righteous strug- 
gle; fraught, too, with momentous and,if successful, with highly 
beneficial results. On this point the judgment of history is 
yet to be passed ; but not doubting what in the main that j ndg- 
ment will be, I shall take it for granted, at least for the pre- 
sent. Here, then, we have two great historic movements ; occur- 
ring in the same laud, among the same people, and each designed 
to further the Divine purpose in the world. One of them oc- 
curred more than four-score years ago — the other is still in full 
progress. Is it not fairly to be presumed that a careful study 
of the former will throw a good deal of light upon the latter ? 
History, it is true, never copies itself. Its march is always 
forward, even when it seems to be retracing its steps. Kew 
and old events often strikingly resemble each other, but when 
most alike, they are also most unlike. The more vital and im- 
portant the epoch, so much the more positively will it be dis- 
tinguished from all that went before. God does not come to 
judgment, and shake the world to its foundation, for the sake 
of merely repeating what He has said and done already. The 
principles of His moral government are immutable, but their 
application is endlessly diversfied. He speaks to each genera- 
tion with a special voice and emphasis, assigns to it fresh tasks, 
and works a work in it which manifests His eternal justice, 
wisdom, and goodness in new forms. Hence, it is so interest- 



THE TIMES OF "WASHINGTON. T 

ing and iustrnctive to consider His ways in the past. "We dis- 
cern in them the operation of the same Providential laws which 
are determining the events of the present ; and although this 
does not enable us to foresee the exact course of those events, 
since the circumstances and ao-ents throno;li which the divine 
laws operate are so different, yet is it eminently fitted to i,n- 
spire us with hope and confidence respecting the final issue. 
For it is hardly needful, I trust, to say from a Christian pulpit, 
that, however much it may appear so to the eye of sense, still 
in point of fact, chance has no veritable rule in this world ; no 
more amidst war and the tumult of the people than in the most 
peaceful times. All things come to pass and are governed ac- 
cording to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. 
He putteth down one and raiseth up another. He sittetli 
above the waterfloods, and reigneth King forever. Events and 
individuals, whether we call tliem small or great, are what 
they are by His ordaining or permissive will. The insect that 
uses up its petty existence in a summer's day is not below, nor 
is the mightiest man on earth above the grasp of that unseen 
but most skillful and resistless Hand, which guides the wheels 
of nature and of history. An impious denial of this truth 
drove the haughty king of Babylon from men, and made him 
" eat grass as oxen, till his hairs were grown like eagles' feathers, 
and his nails like birds' claws." Listen to his own account of 
his recovery from this state of imbruted madness. " And at 
the end of the days, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up mine eyes unto 
heaven, and 7nine understanding returned iinto me, and I Messed 
the Most High, and I jpraised and honored Ilhn that livethfor 
ever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His Jcing- 
dom is from generation to generation ! And all the inhahitatits 
of the earth are rejputed as nothing y and He doelh according to 
His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhahitants of 
the earth / and none can stay His hand, or say unto Him, what 
doest thou ? " > 

It is by the light of this sublime doctrine that w^e must pon- 
der the records of the Past, if we would learn from them wise 
and cheering lessons for the present. "While far from denying the 
freedom and responsibility of human agency, but rather estab- 



8 LESSONS OF ENCOUEAGEMENT FKOM 

lisliing them both, it still asserts the absolute and righteous 
supremacy of the Divine will in all temporal affairs. It is a 
doctrine as comforting as it is sublime ; and was never more 
worthy of being enforced than now. It is a first principle 
of the Christian philosophy of history. Guided by its light, 
let us glance at the times of Washington, and note briefly some 
of the lessons of encouragement which they teach us. God 
M'as then leading our country through a great crisis and turn- 
ing-point in its history. He was preparing to mature and con- 
solidate its different members, yet being imperfect, into a 
free. Christian nation. He was training the Thirteen colonies 
by the rugged discipline of war to understand their own 
weakness, to learn the aecret of their political strength, and 
thus to form themselves into one grand American Union. He 
was educating from among the people of the colonies a race 
of patriot leaders and statesmen, who should frame the right 
Constitution of government for a free Democratic Eepublic ; 
and He was educating the people also to inspire, ordain, and 
establish that Constitution for themselves and their posterity. 
These, we believe, were some of the main designs which Pro- 
vidence Avas bringing to pass in those days, and to the acom- 
plishment of which, all things,we may fairly infer, were intend- 
ed, directly or indirectly, to minister. As we now look back 
upon the memorable period from this distance of time, and 
from the heights of blessing to which it has raised us, how in- 
teresting and impressive the scene ! What grand figures move 
across it! IIow large and far-reaching the events! and what 
is the voice with which it speaks to us in this dread hour? 
What does it say about the fearful and bloody drama enacting 
before our eyes? As I interpret that solemn voice, it says, 
first of all, that the cause which is now at stake is at bottom 
the same good old " American cause" for which Washing- 
ton and his generation fought and toiled ; the same cause, but 
almost a century further advanced. 

The cause of American Liberty and Union, one and indi- 
visible — is not that what the Father of his country fought and 
toiled for ? is not that the burden of his parting counsels 
when gathering about him his untarnished robes of office, he 



THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 



9 



bade the nation farewell, gave it liis blessing, and then, like 
one of the old patriarchs, retired to sleep with his fathers ? 
But although the cause is essentially the same, its importance 
is immeasurably enhanced by new and vast material and 
moral interests with which, in the course of events, it has be- 
come indissolubly connected. With all their foresight and all 
their high hopes, how imperfectly Washington or his genera- 
tion comprehended what the free, national Government which 
they founded was destined to grow to in less than seventy-five 
years ! They thought, no doubt, and some of them predicted, 
that it would wax into a great and fruitful tree of Human 
Liberty ; but who of them dreamed that within so short a period 
its majestic branches would stretch across the Eocky Moun- 
tains and overshadow the far distant shores of the Pacific 
Ocean ! Had they foreknown what was .quickly coming to 
pass : had they been told into what a magnificent civil and 
social temple of Humanity their work would so soon expand, 
I am sure they would have willingly redoubled their sacrifices, 
if needful, and fought on through twice or three times seven 
years ! But what they could not foreknow is to us matter of 
sight and experience. The rapid growth of the Union in 
population, in territory, in agriculture, commerce, manufac- 
tures and the mechanic arts, in wealth and in all the condi- 
tions of material prosperity ; but, more than all, the wonderful 
development of its political, social and spiritual forces are- 
phenomena, which, doubtless, have no parallel in the history 
of the world. If you should search through every library in 
Christendom, you would be able to find no book which contains 
in these respects such an extraordinary body of statistical facts 
as the Eighth census of the United States. And how large a 
portion of these facts are embodiments and practical illustra- 
tions of the democratic American ideas, which are the very 
life and glory of our land ! 

The Union, then, represents the identical cause for which 
our Revolutionary fathers prayed and struggled : in truth, it is 
that grand old cause organized in laws and institutions, armed 
with national government, enriched by an invaluable expe- 
rience, hallowed by a long succession of illustrious memories. 



10 LESSONS OF ENCOUKAGEMENT FEOM 

and now fighting for existence in the name and with the strong 
hand of the sovereign American people. The difference is, 
as I have said, that the lapse of three score years and ten has 
not only raised it to a height of power then nndreampt of, but 
has also clothed it with a moral grandeur and grafted upon 
it immense new interests both human and divine, which 
render its claims upon our devotion peculiar and transcend- 
ant. And now, if this be so — if the contest in which we are en- 
gaged is for essentially the same object and the same principles, 
which called forth the energies and sustained the courage of 
our ilevolutionary sires ; if, in a word, we are striving to defend 
and restore what they at so much cost established, to save the 
national life now in its vigorous manhood, which they watched 
and nurtured with such tender solicitude in its struggling 
infancy, then I think their success "ought to fill us with reli- 
gious hope and confidence as to our own. It is an unspeaka- 
ble encouragement to remember that they saw far darker 
days than w^e have seen, endured trials and suflerings far 
more numerous and severe than we have endured, fought on 
more than three times as long as we have fought — and yet 
they triumphed gloriously in the end. 

This suggests another point. Washington and his compatriots 
encountered and overcame obstacles in the way of their success 
similar to those which now beset the defenders of the Union. 
They had their financial difficulties, and those of the most 
formidable character. There were great military mistakes 
and disasters. There were incompetent and traitorous leaders. 
There were sharp differences of opinion among the friends of 
Independence. Some of the colonies were full of secret and 
open enemies to the cause. Artful plotters of doubt and dis- 
content were found in the most patriotic states and under the 
pretense of neutrality, hatched constant mischief.* There were 

* The following statute enacted by the Legislature of New York in 17*78, will 
illustrate this remark, besides being suggestive in other respects. 

" Whereas, certain inhabitants of this State have, during the course of the 
present cruel war waged by the King and Parliament of Great Britain against 
the people of these States, affected to maintain a neutrality which there is reason 
to suspect was, in many instances, dictated by a poverty of spirit and an undue 
attachment to property ; and whereas, divers of said persons, aome of whom advo- 



THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. H 

editors and politicians then as there are now, who were quite 
willing to sacrifice their country for the sake of gratifying 
their ambitious, mercenary, or vindictive passions. The cor- 
rupt contractors, ravenous extortioners and peculators, who 
since the beginning of our troubles have been so forcibly ex- 
emplifying the doctrine of total depravity, are not without their 
prototypes of those days. There also abounded then, as now, 
captious fault-finders, dismal croakers and men of faint hearts. 
Washington himself, you know, was the object of bitter abuse 
and calumnies ; men not worthy to untie his shoe conspired to 
supplant him in the command of the array and in the confi- 
dence of the country. Lying and slander and misrepresenta- 
tion poisoned the social atmosphere then just as they do now. 
Discouraged by all these things, thousands were ready to 
abandon the cause and make peace on any terms. It is a 
grave error to fancy that the people were thoroughly united 
in those " times that tried men's souls." The want of more 
perfect unity was one of the things that made the times so 
trying. Even good men were not all on the right side ; some of 
them were on the wrong side and continued there to the last. 
It is usually so in great social convulsions. It was so in the civil 
wars of England. It was so in the times of Washington ; and 
we need not be surprised or disheartened that it is so now. 
Let us comfort ourselves in thinking that when the right cause 
shall have triumphed and the incalculable blessings wrapt up 

cated the American cause until it became serious, have, notwithstanding the for- 
bearance of their countrymen, and contrary to their faith pledged by their paroles, 
ungratefully and insidiously, by artful misrepresentations and a subtle dissemina- 
tion of doctrines, fears and apprehensions, false in themselves and injui-ious to the 
American cause, seduced certain weak-minded persons from the duty they owed 
• to their country ; and it being repugnant to justice as well as good policy that 
men should be permitted to shelter themselves under a government which they not 
only refused to assist in rearing, but which they daily endeavor to undermine and 
subvert," " be it enacted," d'c. : 

let. That " all such men be required to take an oath of allegiance," which was 
prescribed in the act ; 

2d. That " if they refuse to take the oath they shall be removed to within the 
enemy's lines ;" and 

3d. " That if they ever return afterwards they shall be adjudged guilty of 
misprision of treason." 



,12 LESSONS OF ENCOURAGEMENT FEOM 

in it for the wliole land and for all mankind shall fully 
appear, then the few good men among us, who opposed it, 
will be overwhelmed with shame and self-reproach ; while the 
myriads who were unwittingly seduced from their mental 
allegiance and thus led to strive against their country, will bless 
Heaven for thwarting their disloyal aims. As for such as tried 
to betray the sacred cause, or to turn its perils into instruments 
of unholy ambition, revenge and fraudulent gain, they will be 
only too glad to slink away and rot in those graves of dishonor 
and oblivion which are already yawning to receive them. 

If history were not full of the lesson, a little reflection ought 
to teach us that eveiy righteous cause struggling to maintain 
itself in such a world as ours must needs encounter severe 
trials and opposition. ISTor can we reasonably expect when 
the social elements are all in tierce commotion, the sea and 
the waves roaring, that no mire and dirt will be cast upon the 
surface. War, especially civil war, is always fraught with 
demoralizing influences. That is one of its worst curses. It 
is the nature of war to breed vice and corruption. Its justice 
— the sacredness and importance of the object for which it is 
waged — aflfords no adequate protection against the mischief; 
and this is one reason why those wicked men, who causelessly 
plunged the nation into this troul)le, are guilty of such a 
gigantic and hideous crime. The most righteous war, then, is 
not without dreadful evils, which may indeed be mitigated, but 
not avoided. It is sure to be attended with fearful loss of life, 
by snftering and bereavement, by destruction and waste of 
property, by moral disorders and calamities which no humane 
mind can contemplate without profound sorrow. And if this 
were all, the case would be sad indeed. But this is not all 
There is another side to the picture. The sword is also an 
instrument of Divine discipline and retribution. It is one of 
the most eftective weapons in the hands of the Almighty for 
executing His temporal judgments, for the punishment of 
wrong doing, and for the education of nations and of indi- 
viduals to obey His will. 

This suggests another lesson of encouragement to be derived 
from the times of Washington. The sufi'erings incident to the 
long war for Independence were, no doubt, immense — the his- 



THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 13 

toi7 of the last two years has made us understand them as we 
never did or could before— but still those sufferings were 
chiefly endured by that age ; while its blood-bought privi- 
leges and institutions, rendered seven-fold more precious, are 
all ours to-day, and will belong, we trust, to our children after 
us to the latest generation. And who does not see that the 
venerated founders of our Government were largely prepared 
for their momentous political task by the struggle and trials of 
the Kevolution ? Where else but in that fiery furnace did 
they acquire the consummate patriotism, the deep wisdom, the 
penetrating and temperate judgment, the patience and perse- 
verance, the conciliatory spirit, and the impassioned devotion 
to liberty, which constituted their qualifications to be the 
founders of such a Government? Nothing can be clearer. 
His observation and experience at the head of the Conti- 
nental army, educated A\^ashington for the great civil duties 
to which he was afterwards called. We owe, in no small 
measure, to the rough schooling of the Eevolutionary War, 
both the institutions which " followed it and the sages who 
formed them. It was thus that God prepared its, specific 
work, and the right master workmen, for that natal age of the 
Eepublic. Who can say that by the colossal war now raging, 
He is not preparing its appointed work, and the right kind of 
workmen for this most critical, advanced age of the Republic ? 
Everybody having an eye to see, may now see that for many 
years we have been approaching a crisis in our existence as a 
free. Christian people, which could be surmounted only by a 
tremendous convulsion. That convulsion is upon us, shaking 
not only this but many other lands. The loathsome and ma- 
lignant disease, which had so long been silently poisoning the 
moral and political life of the country, has broken out wtth a 
violence unparalleled in history. If the most approved signs 
of Providential interposition are not utterly fallacious, then is 
it certain that the Supreme Ruler and Judge of all the earth 
has taken this nation directly in hand ; and that He seems 
fully determined either to cure or to kill it ; one or the other. 
And if He means to cure and save it. He will do so, we may 
be sure, through human agency; He will do so by furnishing 
it with the right sort of counselors and leaders; by educating 



14 LESSONS OF ENCOUBAGEMENT FROM 

the right workmen to do His work, just as He did in the times of 
our fathers ; and as He did then, so now, by training and puri- 
fying them in the fiery furnace of war and of public troubles. 
I believe this Providential training is now going on, and has 
been going on far more rapidly than our impatience is dis- 
posed to admit. I believe that in both the civil and military 
service of the Union there are patriotic men, whose names will 
hereafter fill a resplendent chapter in its history; men who 
have had no other thought or desire than to serve and help to 
save their country, and who, in spite of a thousand obstacles 
and discouragements, have done so with signal courage and 
ability. "We are too near the chief actors in these stupendous 
scenes to judge them fairly. 'Whose mind has not been more 
or less heated by passion? or biased by prejudice? or 
soured and irritated by disappointment ? "Whose eye has had 
no mote, aye, no beam in it? Posterity will, perhaps, stig- 
matize not a little of what some of us fancy to be gold, as mis- 
erable, base counterfeit ; but Posterity will probably stamp 
not a little that we think lightly of as the pure gold of old 
Revolutionary patriotism. "We have been too prone to heap 
up complaints indiscriminately, and to quarrel with every- 
thing short of perfection. " It is certain," says Lord Bacon, 
"that the best governments, yea, and the best men, are like 
the best precious stones, wherein any flaw or icicle or grain 
are seen and noticed more than in those that are generally 
foul and corrupted." "Washington himself, as has been said, 
was thought very poorly of both as a soldier and states- 
man, by some of his impatient and critical contemporaries. 
For myself I regard it as one of the first duties of loyal. 
Christian citizenship to take heed how we wantonly deny 
the merits or exaggerate the faults and involuntary errors of 
those who have been called of Providence and by the national 
voice, to bear, in high places, the heat and burden of this 
withering day of the Lord. They are entitled to our warmest 
sympathy, our prayers, and our most charitable judgment. 
He who willfully abuses and bears false witness against 
them commits a heavy crime against his bleeding country. 
During an ordinary quiet voyage it may do no serious harm to 
go about among the crew, whispering ruthless suspicions and 



THE TIMES OF WASUINGTON. 15 

calumnies against the chief pilot and his officers ; but to do 
this in the midst of a hurricane, when nothing can save the 
ship but relentless vigilance, and the prompt, unquestioning 
obedience of all hands to orders given, is of the very essence 
of mutiny ; and the man guilty of it deserves to be instantly 
cast overboard. Let public blame and censure be founded in 
truth ; let them be iirm, considerate, patriotic in spirit ; and 
even in such an hour as this, they may be highly salutary ; 
otherwise, they are the mere voice of faction. We owe our first 
and paramount allegiance to the Government of the United 
States ; and that allegiance binds us to loyal speech and loyal 
writing, as well as to ofifer up, if need be, all we have, and our 
own lives also, upon the altar of our afflicted country.* 

* Strange to say, the secession dogma about allegiance finds advocates at tlie 
North, in full view of its baleful consequences, and that among men who profess 
to be entirely loyal to the Union. It may be worth while, therefore, to cite the 
judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States on the point, as expressed 
in the recent decision of the Prize cases. In delivering the opinion of the court, 
Mr. Justice Grier said : 

" Under our peculiar Constitution, although the citizens owe supreme allegiance 
to the Federal Government, they owe also a qnalijied allegiance to the States in 
which they are domiciled. * * * * ^\[ persons re- 

siding within this territory, [the so-called Southern Confederacy,] whose property 
may be used to increase the revenues of the hostile power, are, in this condition 
liable to be treated as enemies, though not foreigners. They have cast off their 
allegiance, and made war on their Government, and are not the less enemies be- 
cause they are traitors /" 

The doctrine of no allegiance, or of a secondary, conditional allegiance, to the 
National Government, is almost as fatal to oilr American political system as the 
doctrine of atheism to the system of Christian faith. It is the irpuirov tpevdo^ — 
the logical and moral tap-root of secession. By this doctrine the chief priests 
and leaders of the Slaveholders' Rebellion fancy they have succeeded in absolving 
their followers from the crime of treason and in absolving themselves from the 
double sin of both treason and perjury. But it is a vain delusion. Their hands are 
stained with the blood of myriads of their innocent countrymen, and no mortal 
power can make those hands clean again ; all the perfumes of Arabia will not 
sweeten them. 

If any one wishes to see a thorough exposition of the principles upon which 
the duty of supreme allegiance to the National Government is based, let him 
read Daniel Webster's speech, delivered in the Senate of the United States, on 
the 16th of February, 1S33, in reply to the speech of Mr. CaUioun in support of 
his famous " Compact" or right of secession resolution. It is entitled : " ^J'he Con 
siitution not a compact between Sovereign States," and exhausts the subject. For 



16 LESSONS OF ENCOURAGEMENT FROM 

I do not doubt, then, I repeat it, that this crisis is ah-eady 
training men, not merely for the immediate work of subduing 
the rebellion, but for the weightiest tasks in the future. Out 
of this war will emerge young men, in all the professions and 
walks of life, whose minds have been enlarged and illumi- 
nated by great national and Christian ideas, whose patriotism 
has been baptized in tears and blood, who have forsworn all 

power of reasoning, massive strength of thought, and deep political insight, it is 
unsurpassed by any other speech of the great son of New England. The argu- 
ment is as conclusive as a mathemathical demonstration. This speech was made 
thirty j-ears ago, but the constitutional doctrine which it unfolds, and the 
patriotic solicitude which it breathes, seem to have been intended expressly for 
the present hour. As we read the following passage, for example, in the light 
of what is going on before our eyes, how solemn and prophetic it sounds : 

" Mr. President, if the friends of nullification should be able to propagate 
their 02)inions, and give them jjractical effect, they would, in my judgment, prove 
themselves the most skillful " architects of ruin," the most effectual extinguish- 
ers of high-raised expectations, the greatest blasters of Jiuman hopes, that any 
age has produced. They would stand up to proclaim, in tones which would 
pierce the ears of half the human race, that the last great experiment of repre- 
sentative self-government had failed. They would send forth sounds, at the 
hearing of which, the doctrine of the divine right of kings would feel, even in 
its grave, a returning sensation of vitality and resuscitation. Millions of eyes, of 
those who now feed their inherent love of liberty on the success of the American 
example, would turn away from beholding our dismemberment, and find no 
place on eartli whereon to rest their gratified sight. Amidst the incantations 
and orgies of nullification, secession, disunion, and revolution, would be celebra- 
ted the funeral rites of constitutional and republican liberty." 

How characteristic of the Defender of the Constitution, and how appropriate 
in this dread hour that is upon us, are the closing sentiments of this noble 
speech ! 

" We cannot, we must not, we dare not, omit to do that which, in our judg- 
ment, the safety of the Union requires. Not regardless of consequences, we 
must yet meet consequences ; seeing the hazards which surround the discharge 
of public duty, it must yet be discharged. For myself, sir, I shun no responsi- 
bility justly devolving upon me, here or elsewhere, in attempting to maintain 
the cause. I am bound to it by indissoluble ties of affection and duty, and I 
shall cheerfully partake in its fortunes and its fate. I am ready to perform my 
own appropriate part, whenever and wherever the occasion may call on me, And 
to take my chance among those upon whom blows may fall first and fall thickest. 
1 shall exert every faculty I possess in aiding to prevent the Constitution from 
being nullified, destroyed or impaired; and even should I see it fall, I will still, 
with a voice feeble, perhaps, but earnest as ever issued from human lips, and 
•with fidelity and zeal which nothing shall extinguish, call on the PEOPLE to 
come to the rescue I" 



THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. ^ 17 

local and party prejudices, and consecrated themselves to the 
undivided service of God and their country ; " young men full 
of towardness and hope, such as the poets call aurorj!: kilh, 
^ons of the Ilornhtg /" Young men fashioned after tliis man- 
ner, are such stuff as our noblest sires were made of. We 
shall be blessed with an elect race of them ; and they, l)y the 
favor of God, will have a master-hand in guiding and shaping 
the coming fortunes of the Union. When the intellectual and 
moral life of a people is vigorous, where the national soil is 
deep and genial, there great civil troubles always develop the 
sturdiest and most benignant public virtues. I believe it will 
be so now. We must not, indeed, look for another Washing- 
ton : one such character is enough for us — enough for all time. 
But we shall have an order of earnest citizens and statesmen, 
not unworthy to have been the friends and counselors and 
fellow-workers of the Father of his Country. There will arise 
forms of Christian manhood and patriotism commensurate 
with the imperial grandeur, power, and world-wide mission 
of the regenerated Republic. The ancestral type of American 
character, with its sturdy sense and vigor, bold self-reliance, 
free intelligence, deep moral and religious convictions, love of 
order, its democratic spirit, and hatred of injustice, will reap- 
pear in new strength and beauty ; but purihed, let ns hope, 
from the vices of a later age, and enriched, too, with heroic 
Christian qualities, which it will have gained by the trying 
and unexampled experience through which we are passing. 

I am not ignorant that some cast a very diti'erent horoscope 
of the future. They see no light ahead, no bright star of pro- 
mise above, but only clouds and darkness. They think the 
Republic has seen its best days, and is now sick unto death. 
Tliey seem to have no confidence in tlie present, and little hope 
in any future generation. They fear, indeed, that God has 
forsaken His heritage forever. " Ichabod," they say : '■'The 
glory has departed from Israel^'' But I do not believe that 
the glory has departed. The loyal spirit of the people (to 
bon'ow the words of Milton, in reply to the doubters and pro- 
phets of evil amidst the civil distractions of his day,) the loy- 
al spirit of the people, if you consider it well, " betokens us not 



18 LESSONS OF ENCOUBAGEMENT FROM 

degenerated, nor drooping to a fatal decay, by casting off tlie 
old and wrinkled skin of corrui^tion, to outlive these pangs, 
and wax young again, entering the glorious ways of truth and 
prosperous virtue, destined to become great and honorable in 
these latter ages. Methiiiks I see in my mind a noble and 
puissant nation, rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, 
and shaking her invincible locks ; methinks I see her, as an 
eagle muing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled 
eyes at the full midday beam, purging and unsealing her 
long abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance ; 
while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with 
those also that love the twilight, flutter about, amazed at what 
she means, and, in their envious gobble, would prognosticate " 
approaching ruin. 

It was my intention to cite some passages from the Farewell 
Address, in illustration of what I have been saying. That 
unique and immortal document — the most impressive legacy 
of patriotic wisdom and affection ever penned by an uninspired 
hand, is mainly devoted to counsels on the priceless blessings of 
liberty and the* Union, the perils to which they would be ex- 
posed, and the right way of preserving them. A better touch- 
stone of the real character of our national struggle could hard- 
ly be desired than the simple fact that while most of Washing- 
ton's Farewell Address would sound, in the ears of the men in 
arms against the Government, as both false and bitterly re- 
proachful, there is not, on the other hand, a loyal heart in the 
nation which does not beat in unison with every part of it ; 
there is not a loyal ear in the nation upon which its touching 
and patriarchal counsels do not fall with a kind of supernatu- 
ral force ; there is not a pulpit in the land, from which it 
might not be read this morning, in perfect consonance with 
the sanctity of the day, and with the spirit of every loyal wor- 
shipper. Is that a mere accident ? Take a single sentence : 

" The unity of government, which constitutes you one peo- 
ple, is now also dear to you. It is justly so ; for it is a main 
pillar in the edifice of your real independance ; the support 
of your tranquillity at home, of your power abroad, of your 
safety, of your prosperity, of that very Liberty whidi you so 



THE TIMES OF WASHINGTON. 19 

highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that from different 
causes, and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, 
many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the con- 
viction of this truth, as this is the point in your political fort- 
ress against which the batteries of internal and external ene- 
mies will be most constantly and actively (though often co- 
vertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite motnent that 
you should properly estimate the immense value of your Na- 
tional Union to your collective and individual happiness ; that 
you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attach- 
ment to it, accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it 
as of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity ; 
watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety ; discoun- 
tenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can^ 
in any event, be abandoned ; indignantly frowning at the first 
dawning of any attempt to alienate any portion of our coun- 
try from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now 
link together the various parts." 

Imagine this passage read, or its sentiments littered from 
the pulpit, to-day, in Eichmond, or Charleston ! 

I have thus noted some of the lessons of encouragement 
which may be drawn from considering the way in which God 
led our fathers of the Revolution through the troubles of their 
time. It has not been my aim to discuss the general ques- 
tions of the war, to vindicate the justice of the national cause,, 
or to show how momentous are the consequences it involves 
to us and our children, to the American people, to the church 
of Christ, and to mankind. On all these points I have spoken 
to you many times, already ; and on them all, let me add, my 
convictions remain unchanged, except that they have grown 
more intense and profound. Every month, every week, every 
day, the one great issue has been defining itself, or rather 
Almighty Providence has been defining it for us, with more 
and more awful distinctness, until we find ourselves absolute- 
ly shut up to one of two things : shut up as by a wall of ada- 
mant. We must either decide to let this Eebellion triumph, 
with all its shameless hypocrisy, perjuries, treason, and other 
heaven-defying crimes upon its head ; triumph by planting 



20 LESSONS OF ENCOUEAGEMENT FEOM 

its iron heel yet more firmly upon the necks of its millions of 
black and white victims ; triumph in the destruction of this 
great and matchless Christian Nationality : triumph in becom- 
ing a perpetual terror to us and to the world : or else^ with 
one heart and one mind, we must go straight forward, smit- 
ing it still with the sharp sword of justice, until, conquered 
and crushed, at whatever cost of time and blood and treasure, 
it shall live thenceforth only in the scorn and abhorrence of 
mankind, as the most causeless, wicked, and dreadful, re- 
corded in history. This is the stern dilemma which confronts 
us ; and let every man, in the fear of God, remembering the 
honored past, and, tliinking of his children after him for a 
thousand generations, choose which horn of it he will. Neu- 
trality, in the face of such an issue, is moral cowardice and 
crime. 

May it please the Almighty Ruler of the world to breathe 
continually upon the hearts of the people, to uphold their 
fainting spirits, and arm them with fresh courage and confi- 
dence in Himself, as new exigencies arise ; to give them, and 
their leaders also, as lie gave to Solomon, and as He gave, in 
BO eminent a degree, to our own Washington, " wisdom and 
understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart as the 
Band that is upon the sea-shore." 

The Lord our God he with its^ as He was with our fathers : 
let Him not leave us nor forsake us : That He may incline our 
hearts unto Him, to walk in all His ways, and to keep His 
commandments, and His statutes, and His judgments, ivhich He 
commanded our fathers. God he mereiful unto us, and bless tcs, 
and. cause His face to shine upon us: That Thy way ?nay be 
known upon earth, Thy saving health among all nations. 

Amen and Amen. 



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